Maxwell considered this young officer a formidable rival, and he resolved to retrieve himself at once.  Upon his personal attractions he relied to overcome the lady’s disfavor; and, notwithstanding the unequivocal intention of discountenancing his suit she had manifested, he resolved to open his campaign by addressing her, eloquently and tenderly, through the medium of a letter.  He felt that he could in this manner gain her attention to his suit,—­a point which his vanity assured him was equivalent to a victory.  But his philosophy and his vanity were both sorely tried by the return of the letter unopened.  His point was lost, and he was harassing his fertile brain with vain attempts to suggest any scheme short of honest, straight-forward wooing,—­which the circumstances seemed to interdict,—­when the visit of the lady herself rendered further efforts useless.

His position, resting, as it did, on the purpose of marrying the heiress,—­a purpose too deeply incorporated with his future prospects to be resigned,—­was now a desperate one.  Through the long vista of struggles and difficulties he saw his end, and the fact that he had to some extent compromised his heart stimulated him still more to meet and overcome the barriers that environed him.

For an hour after the lady’s departure the young lawyer pondered the obstacles which beset him.  With the aspect of an angry rather than a disappointed man, he paced the office with rapid and irregular strides.  He could devise no expedient.  A lady’s will is absolute, and he must bend in submission.  He blamed his own tardiness one moment, and his precipitancy the next; then he cursed his ill luck, and vented his anger and disappointment in a volley of oaths.

His meditations were again interrupted, by his attendant’s announcement of “Mr. Dumont.”

“Ah, good-morning, sir!  I was just on the point of going to Bellevue.  Nothing serious has happened, I trust,” said Maxwell, laying aside, with no apparent effort, his troubled visage, and assuming his usual bland demeanor.

“Nothing,” replied the visitor, gruffly.

“Your niece left the office an hour since,” continued Maxwell.  “She requested me immediately to visit your brother.”

“Which you have not done,” returned the visitor, whom we will style Jaspar, to distinguish him from his brother, Colonel Dumont.

“But which I intend to do at once, a little matter having detained me longer than I supposed it would.”

“I will save you the trouble.  The business upon which my brother wished to see you was concerning his will.”

“Indeed, sir!  I hope he is not dangerously ill,” said Maxwell, in apparent alarm.

“Not at all.  The doctor says he will be out in a week; but he thinks otherwise, and is now engaged in putting his house in order,” replied Jaspar, with a sickly smile.

“I am glad he is no worse, though it is better at all times to be prepared for the final event.”